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Azerbaijan seeks to see Europe as long-term market for gas supplies

At the meeting with EU Council President Hermann van Rompuy President Ilkham Aliyev said Azerbaijan offered its services to Europe over diversified gas supplies

BRUSSELS, June 21 (Itar-Tass) - Azerbaijan seeks to see Europe as “the long-term and large-scale market” for its gas supplies by the Southern Corridor, President Ilkham Aliyev said.

At the meeting with the EU Council President, Hermann van Rompuy, on Friday, Aliyev said Azerbaijan offered its services to Europe over diversified gas supplies.

“The launch of the Trans-Adriatic gas pipeline project is the important decision to create the Southern Corridor, which will make it possible to change Europe’s energy map,” the Azerbaijani president said.

The future of the Southern Gas Corridor mainly depends on Azerbaijan’s decision to supply gas from the Shah Deniz deposit. Two projects are set at stake - the Trans-Adriatic gas pipeline project and Nabucco-West.

Nabucco-West should run to Austria from Turkey via the Balkan countries and supply gas to the EU countries via the Austrian hub and transit Balkan countries.

The Trans-Adriatic project minimizes the number of transit states and runs gas to Italy from Turkey through Greece and Albania. It supplies gas to West European countries. In any case Turkey remains the key and unchanged country in all transit projects.

In the future the European Union intends to supply gas by the Southern Corridor from Turkmenistan and North Iraq. Till 2007 experts hope to involve Iranian gas in the project. But the plans failed due to the degradation of relations between the EU and Iran.

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